Just a word now and then about working in a prison and for the Department Of Corrections. Plus a good bit of ranting here and there.

Sunday, September 13, 2009

So Freaking Happy To Be Back

Holy snap.

I think they were saving up stupidity and craziness.... just waiting for me to come back. How I got through this night without having to do a bunch of paperwork is beyond me.

Everything was okay when I got in. Normal everyday Hive stuff. BG and I went out and did a round of rec when we came in. No big deal. Came back in at 3:00 and put them back in their cells. Did my checks.... no big deal. Just like always.

There had been little or no radio traffic during most of this time. It was a typical sunday, nothing going on. Then I heard them call the P-car to check about four or five zones all at the same time. A bit odd, but it does happen. It's usually a flock or two of birds.

Then about 3:15 I heard them close the yards. I thought to myself "Hmmmm... something must be going on. I wonder what's up?" They usually don't close the yards until four.

A few minutes later out power went out. Not completely, just about half of it. Chuck and the Singing Cowboy were out with Ms Nancynurse doing medpass. About half of the lights are on in the wings. It's dim, but not too bad. Then Ms Maybe up in the bubble tells me she keeps popping the cell door they are standing at but it won't open. Hmmm.... bad news. We aren't getting enough power through the system to open the doors.

So we have to get out the keys. All of them. And I got to sign for them. It took me awhile to remember which keys we needed to get all the doors open. It turns out we needed about six rings of keys. They all did different things. I sounded like a car wreck walking down the walk with all of those stupid keys on my belt.

And C-wing was the worst. It has the slider doors. To open those without power you have to open a big box out in the sally port and throw a couple of big levers. There are four levers and if you throw the wrong two it will just open all of the doors at once. Not a good idea. The other two open little access panels above the doors and you use a little t-handle wrench to open each door individually. To close them you just drag them shut again and they lock.

Aint that just snappy?

So we get meds done and food passed and trays picked up and the workers out of the house and... the power goes out completely. No lights, no intercoms, no door controls, no fans, no computers to look up information. Nothing.

And then the lockups start. And of course we were completely full already. Running around in the dark getting property and kicking guys out just as fast as we were locking them up.

And as they bring one guy in he says to me "I'm not going in any cell you put me in. I will only cell with one person in this house." His boyfriend had just gotten locked up minutes before and he demanded to be put in a cell with him.

Well, that just wasn't going to happen. Not on my shift, anyway. And not if Sarge Miz P had anything to say about it. SO we put him on the bench and let him wait. And we start trying to move people around.

While this is going on the Cowboy is upstairs in C-wing and we hear him call the Sarge on the radio. We all go trotting up there and this knucklehead is apparently trying to drown himself in the toilet. Buck naked with his head in the toilet and shaking all over.

Hoo boy.

Grab him and put him on the floor and cuff him up. Breathing? Yes. Good. Now what?

Call medical. Call the Lieutenant. Put him on suicide watch. Where? The cells are all full. Oh snap. In the meantime we have loverboy on the bench in C-wing and his boyfriend on the bench in B-wing and neither one of them is going to go in a cell anywhere except together.

Oh my. And will you just look at the time? It's time for me to go.

I ask Sarge Miz P "Do you need me to stay and help?" She just shakes her head and says "Get out while you can! Run!!!"

So I did. Met Captain Woodman (he looks just like the grumpy principal from "Welcome back Kotter") on his way down to the Hive to fix all of our mistakes.

I told him "Good Luck" but I didn't really mean it.

What a night.....

Somewhere in the middle of all that snap the power came back on. I barely even noticed.

2 comments:

KP- Yeah, thanks.. And where were you? At home taking it easy, I'm sure. Never mind it was your day off and all that.

And I forgot to mention the guy in B-wing that had the grand mal seizures. Had to hold his head to keep it from bouncing on the floor until medical got there.... And he was covered all down the front with pee. Icing on the freaking cake, if you ask me.